


Sea, Swan, Memory, Girl

by Argyle



Category: The Sandman
Genre: Dreamscapes, Gen, Pirates, Purple Prose, swashbucklathon 2007
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-01-21
Updated: 2007-01-21
Packaged: 2017-11-03 12:48:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/381501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Argyle/pseuds/Argyle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Who knows who goes within oneself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sea, Swan, Memory, Girl

In the bluest waters of the ocean, bluer than the daydreams of yellow giants and the whispers of soft-shelled beetles, there is an island.  
  
It is not on any map, and yet sailors the world over know of its presence. They speak of it between tankards and flasks in dark taverns by the pier; it is called Devil, and Mystery, and Muse. It cannot be found by star charts and astrolabes, and it cannot be seen from starboard or port. Rather, it comes upon ships like the mists of the void: in the midst of a storm, it may be glimpsed between flashes of lightning, and before the residual clap of thunder rumbles the deck beneath their feet, the winds of the cove swell against them with the half-mad shriek of a storybook siren.  
  
And how the sailors despair to see it, for they know all is lost.  
  
Their ships are shattered on the shore, run afoul in the tracks of the unseen multitudes which came before them. Torn sails swing between felled masts.  
  
Only the tide is patient through such long hours: one, two, three, four, and all the minutes in-between. By dawn, the sailors are crying out, blinking brine from the creases of their eyes and hobbling through the wreckage.  
  
Many die. Their bones are picked clean by gulls, dried like driftwood, bleached like clamshells. They rest among the dark, jagged jetty rocks. They go unnamed.  
  
And the sailors who live?  
  
They suppose, quite reasonably, that they are damned, or worse. For what else could be thought of the undying sun: its rays fall in heavy barbs across their scarred backs and cast their flesh in red. Long ago, it dried up their water, toughened their tongues like November cod, and now it has turned their hair quite gold.  
  
It also makes them see things, from time to time.  
  
Today, they see this: a girl on the beach drawing stars in the sand.  
  
They have seen her before, but not in this way. She wears a bright jacket over bright stockings and bright shoes. But then again, no: she wears a dress made of banana leaves and velvet ribbon. And then again, she wears a tunic of old cereal packages and jackboots, crested by bottle glass and hemmed with the sky.  
  
The sailors come from all nations, and serve beneath all flags; they know the courts of Barcelona, the clear air of Carthage, and the spires of Beijing. They are the king's pride, the nation's honor, the scourge of the open waters. They are captains and deckhands, naval officers, merchants, and pirates.  
  
Still, they understand her in precisely the same way.  
  
They don't understand her at all.  
  
They watch her and remember their mothers, their sisters and lost loves. They don't long for her, nor do they feel themselves to be in her company. No, they only feel the sun on their faces, and hear her hushed voice as it thumps through their brains.  
  
"Yesterday I thought of a new, um, kind of shirt for people to wear, only people wear it on their legs. Then they can _look_ like they're walking on their hands when they're _not_ at all. That happens to big stinky stretchy crawly bugs sometimes."  
  
And for a moment, the words fall from her lips like all the spun silk of the Orient: red, green, gold, black. She says, "Oh," and the word is a windblown standard. She says, "I forgot," and is surrounded by blue-gray talons of opium smoke.  
  
She suddenly sees them; they've never not seen her.  
  
"You know, the trees are _breathing_ like rocket ships."  
  
They are surrounded with the deep exhalation of a thousand trees.  
  
It is only afterwards, when the world is quiet, that the sky breaks open.  
  
Of course, such a thing is impossible. The sky cannot break. But it can unzip: slowly, slowly a patch of cloud unfolds to the crisp sound of metal teeth on metal teeth. A long-muzzled dog peeks his head out, looks left and right, and then hops down to the beach. He takes a long moment to sniff the air, and then rolls about in the sand with immense enjoyment.  
  
"It's been a while," he says in a voice that is gruff and good-natured, "since I did that."  
  
And the girl's hair turns blue and yellow at the sight of him. He drops her drawing stick, laughs, and skips over to greet him where the sea meets the land. "Doggie!" she cries, scratching the tender fur between his ears.  
  
"Where've _you_ been?"  
  
"Here. Um. And there." She points to a palm tree several strides away. "Making things."  
  
"Is that so?" The dog looks her in the eye, and then raises his head.  
  
Above them, and far above the sailors, a neat black umbrella pokes out from the sky. It is followed by the shadow of a girl, and then the girl herself.  
  
She is exactly as they knew she would be. Her smile rains down on them, and they draw in the warmth of her as would spring's first snowdrops of the sun. She has dark hair which pokes out from beneath a dark bandanna, dark eyes and dark lips. But her hands are pale and sturdy, poised in midair like dear doves.  
  
And then the umbrella pops open. She adjusts her grip on its unblinking mallard's head handle, and though the air is quite still, she glides down and down until her boot heels make pockmarks in the damp sand.  
  
"Wow! I've always wanted to do that," she laughs, resting the umbrella's glinting spine on her bare shoulder.  
  
"I suppose I should've waited." If there is any hint of wariness in the dog's voice, he hides it well, and his tail wags as he continues, "But then again, there's no such thing as a free ride."  
  
"You'd be surprised."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
"Yep." The dark girl's smile widens. She reaches forward to push a pink shock of hair from the other's brow. "Hiya sis. We've been looking _everywhere_ for you."  
  
"Did you look on that planet with all the talking rocks?"  
  
"It was next on our list."  
  
"Well, I wasn't on that planet with all the talking rocks."  
  
"That's right," the dog broke in. "She's been _here_ all along."  
  
"And sometimes _there_." The younger sister uses two fingers to walk upon the air. " _And_ sometimes _when_."  
  
"I see." The pendant which rests upon the dark girl's breast gleams in the sunlight, and she suddenly turns to stare directly at the sailors. "You've kept busy."  
  
"I've! Been! Making things!" She trots forward to stand amidst the sailors, hugs herself, and then pats the knit cap of a Turkish first mate. He stirs, and then breathes deeply of the salt air. "See?"  
  
"How do you keep their heads on?"  
  
"Chewing gum. I can... Um. Do a few at a time, like maybe fifteen, but then I have to stop when my tongue gets tired. I _tried_ to use string, but my teeth were too tingly." A pause, and then: "You can make one! Maybe a big beardy pirate. And Doggie can make a fat little admiral. He'll have gold teeth and a wooden leg. I don't have enough of _those_."  
  
"And _I_ don't have thumbs," the dog grunts, shifting his weight.  
  
"I like your scarf," the bright girl says suddenly and solemnly.  
  
Her sister tilts her head. Then she unties the long ends at the nape of her neck, shakes the bandanna loose, and hands it over. It is covered in what might be skulls and might be cherry blossoms, and so are both. "Here you go."  
  
"You mean I can have it?"  
  
"Sure. I have hundreds."  
  
The younger one grins excitedly and ties the bandanna about her waist. "We can stay here," she says. "And they'll," she points at the sailors, "they'll stay here too. Forever and always."  
  
"Sorry, sis. It doesn't work quite that way. That's the thing about borrowing Time," the dark girl says. "You eventually have to give it back."  
  
"But I didn't borrow it... I burrowed it. And the island."  
  
"You'll have to give that back too."  
  
"It's his, isn't it? Our brother's. It's, um, a _nice_ island, don't you think? Or don't you?"  
  
"Very nice."  
  
"And he wasn't using it. Not anymore," says the younger one. "I think he _forgot_. It was so far away from some things, and so close to everything else. I like that. But I didn't ask. He'd be mad if he knew, wouldn't he?"  
  
The dark girl shakes her head. "Not if I have anything to say about it."  
  
"Oh."  
  
"Pardon the intrusion, ladies, but some of us have a schedule to adhere to." The dog yawns gapingly, his long, pink tongue lolling out between his teeth, and stretches his rear legs. Then he says, "About dinnertime, if you know what I mean."  
  
"I have food here, Doggie! There's broccoli and clocks and postcards and piano keys. And, um, little chocolate fishes."  
  
The dog's ears perk up. "Chocolate?"  
  
"Barnabas is right, Del. It's time to go."  
  
"Oh," she says again, and scrunches her nose. "I think. Um. The door's not really _here_. And it's not really _there_ , either."  
  
"Well, that's easy enough. We'll just call Dream, and then he can--"  
  
"No, no. Wait. I mean, if you call him, he'll be _scary_. He'll _look_ at me like he always does, and he'll _say_ things." She narrows her eyes. "I can find it."  
  
Without another word, she crosses the beach and retrieves her stick, testing the sand here and there before eventually stopping beneath the slim shadow of a palm tree. Then she draws an X.  
  
She waits. Her sister waits. The dog, Barnabas, waits.  
  
The sailors wait.  
  
And where the X had been there now rests a prostrate door. Its frame is crafted from anchors and deep, earthen ore.  
  
"What d'ya know," the dog pants jovially. "X really does mark the spot."  
  
"Shh."  
  
The girl listens at the keyhole, her small form pressed up against the barnacle-clad paneling, and she whispers, "I can hear the circus."  
  
After a moment, they all hear the circus, the laughter of children, the clip-clap-clatter of popcorn machines, and the whoosh of the swinging Galleon. But the door is locked. The girl raises herself up with a shrug. "Maybe if we make ourselves _small_ , then we could slide underneath it."  
  
The dog sniffs at the tarnished brass knob. "There must be a key," he grumbles, after a moment. He licks his chops. "Sounds like good eating in there."  
  
"Don't _you_ have it?"  
  
"No pockets. But maybe it's in one of yours."   
  
The girl empties her pockets: a nickel squashed by a steam engine, a scrap of ether from Before, a hatpin in the shape of a yellow giant, a swallow's tail, a robin's breast, a crow's foot, and a package of grass-flavored chewing gum. But she has no key.  
  
"Why don't we just knock?" offers the darker girl. She kneels down, the breeze lightly rustling the hair about her temples, and raps her pale knuckles against the door once, twice. The world shifts. The door looms before them, tall and proud; it casts no shadow. Then it creaks open.  
  
The dog is the first one through. His mistress follows closely behind him.  
  
And the third turns round, gazing over the beach. She watches the gulls, and the slow, patient tide. She looks at the sailors, and smiles. They are made of driftwood and clamshells.  
  
Then she steps through the doorway.  
  
The sun slips towards the horizon; it casts red pigment across the sea's rippled back.  
  
And though the sisters have gone, the sailors still feel them. They know they will not remember, but still, gasping, understand that they must. For what a curse it was to forget.  
  
They give each a name. The older one, the girl with dark hair and a laughing sort of smile, they call Swan. The other, the girl with roses in her eyes, they call March.  
  
They name them before sleeping, and hope to walk together in dreams.


End file.
